Hectic parleys had just picked up on both these fronts when the Supreme Court dropped a bombshell on Monday.

In a major setback to Lalu, a bench of Arun Mishra and Amitava Roy ruled that the RJD leader will stand a separate trial in all four fodder scam cases as it set aside the Jharkhand High Court's order which had dropped conspiracy charges against him.

Significantly, the bench directed the trial court to complete the proceedings against 68-year-old Lalu and others within nine months.

'We have held that for each offence there will be a separate trial,' the bench said.

On October 3, 2013, Lalu was sentenced to five years' imprisonment in another case of fodder scam by a special CBI court, which had disqualified him from membership of Parliament and also rendered him ineligible for contesting elections for 11 years.

The apex court has granted him bail in that case and is hearing his appeal.

The apex court, while setting aside the 2014 high court order which had stayed the trial against Yadav after conviction in one of the cases, said the high court should have been consistent in its findings and not have given different views for different sets of accused in a case.

The apex court was delivering verdict in an appeal filed by the CBI against a November 15, 2014 Jharkhand High Court order, dropping conspiracy charge against him in a case related to the fodder scam on the ground that a person cannot be tried twice for the same offence.

The charges are in connection with 'fraudulent withdrawal' of Rs 96 lakh during the chief ministerial tenure of the RJD chief.